En route to Westchester a couple of weekends ago, traffic built up on the Taconic parkway just shy of the Amvets Memorial Bridge - a fine place to slow down as the views from the historic, red bridge are really lovely. At a slow clip of under 5 mph a shadow of a leaf flickered across the front windshield. Upon checking the rear view mirror a couple of minutes later I discovered that the "leaf" had seemingly transformed into a rather large brown praying mantis who was now on our rear windshield, calmly peering into our car, taking note of the contents of our messy trunk and the slightly amused/terrified children. It stayed there during the traffic jam but once we started picking up speed, it held on for a bit, decided that there wasn't sufficient grip on the windshield, took a few 50 mph shaky steps up and over the car and presumably back into the air. We slid open the interior covering for the moonroof, hoping/not hoping that it'd continued to cling and walk across the car but it was indeed gone perhaps to float into and cling along another car.
Such a beautiful description of the shift that happens in August. I once spent a large part of an afternoon watching my cat, Max the Maine Coon, watch a mantis while it watched him. Every time it turned its head to look towards him, he’d make a funny little meow and move to a point out of the mantis’s line of sight. Then the mantis would turn its head again. Repeat. It was amazing to watch these two beings in their awareness of each other.
I have to admit that I have run away from a mantis before. It happened over ten years ago when I was living in Argentina where all of the insects just seemed bigger than I was used to. I can’t remember exactly if the mantis incident was before or after the bat in our apartment incident, but having a large flying (the first time I’d ever seen a praying mantis fly!) unidentified thing flying across the room was enough to make me skittish.
En route to Westchester a couple of weekends ago, traffic built up on the Taconic parkway just shy of the Amvets Memorial Bridge - a fine place to slow down as the views from the historic, red bridge are really lovely. At a slow clip of under 5 mph a shadow of a leaf flickered across the front windshield. Upon checking the rear view mirror a couple of minutes later I discovered that the "leaf" had seemingly transformed into a rather large brown praying mantis who was now on our rear windshield, calmly peering into our car, taking note of the contents of our messy trunk and the slightly amused/terrified children. It stayed there during the traffic jam but once we started picking up speed, it held on for a bit, decided that there wasn't sufficient grip on the windshield, took a few 50 mph shaky steps up and over the car and presumably back into the air. We slid open the interior covering for the moonroof, hoping/not hoping that it'd continued to cling and walk across the car but it was indeed gone perhaps to float into and cling along another car.
Such a beautiful description of the shift that happens in August. I once spent a large part of an afternoon watching my cat, Max the Maine Coon, watch a mantis while it watched him. Every time it turned its head to look towards him, he’d make a funny little meow and move to a point out of the mantis’s line of sight. Then the mantis would turn its head again. Repeat. It was amazing to watch these two beings in their awareness of each other.
I love praying mantises and have done since I was a child. Thank you for this, and your lovely illustration.
I have to admit that I have run away from a mantis before. It happened over ten years ago when I was living in Argentina where all of the insects just seemed bigger than I was used to. I can’t remember exactly if the mantis incident was before or after the bat in our apartment incident, but having a large flying (the first time I’d ever seen a praying mantis fly!) unidentified thing flying across the room was enough to make me skittish.